... and yet ... I watched every minute of it and loved it! The only reason I didn't mind it finishing when it did was because my dinner got served. Can you tell us from which year and day/stage it was from? (I'm assuming it was a Dakar and it seemed like Argentina so maybe a couple of years ago and an early stage, day 2 or 3 -ish?)
Cheers
JayBo

Its a long way from mustering sheep and cattle in Queenslands outback to conquering the worlds most challenging motorbike desert race.

. . .

Less than 20 Australians have ever finished the 8000km Dakar rally in its 34-year history.

. . .

I do the Finke desert race and the Australian Safari over here, which are the best weve got to prepare ourselves but things like dune riding in Peru are totally different to anything thats available in Australia, he said.

. . .

On another stage a crash resulted in his Camelbak springing a leak and a bout of dehydration after riding for a few hundred kilometres without water.

I was getting hazy and it was affecting my vision but I just tried to take it easy, Rod said.

Coming back to Longreach and work &#8211; he&#8217;s a qualified motor mechanic and owns the Centretune Motorcycles business &#8211; has almost been an anticlimax. &#8220;I was back to work straight away, dealing with the backlog,&#8221; he said.

And after reading this, I wonder if maybe there were another way to help support riders: An work exchange program.

While a person couldn't replace a competitor's knowledge or skill, (don't think many could do Pyndon's job, period) I wonder if in some cases a person could spend 2-3 weeks (dude ranch style?) filling in for a rider while they're on the Dakar. It certainly wouldn't work in every situation, but might be a way to ease some stress or an absent body for the self employed ones...

I'm not sure just a single year of learning about rally is enough to put someone in a position to win Dakar, unless that whole year was spent doing rally events. I think it would take a bit more than that to get to the TOP with navigation and multi-day rally events. Given that Quinn Cody already has navigation and Dakar experience, and he's fast, I'd have him on the list.